HE WITH HORNS
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If Dalton was the starting QB for the Rams, he wouldn't have fared very well. Do you really think he would have led us to the playoffs? Was he going to catch the ball himself?
Andy Dalton 6 year contract extension?
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LazyWinker
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But Brandon Gibson and Danny Amenodola both inked big free agent deals.
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I read some were, to get a True picture of were a team is really at you need only look at it previous 2-3 years. I agree! And I'm getting REALLY tired of people who keep wanting to look at the last "10 Years"!! That BS! this is a New Admin. get used to it!!
mr.stlouis
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Not a bad point, my friend. I just think Sam puts it together this year and we make the Playoffs.
Bradford will get a little more than Flacco, IMO. Sounds about right.
Last edited:
Irish
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Are you kidding? The Ravens are being panned for the contract they gave Flacco; some calling it the worst QB contract in the league, and Flacco won a Superbowl and a Superbowl MVP.
Sam hasn't won ANYTHING close to that. If Bradford gets better money than Flacco then the entire front office deserves to get fired. For a franchise built on a litany of mistakes and lapses in judgement, it would be the crown jewel.
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Bengals Foolhardy to Push All-In on Mediocre Andy Dalton
By Michael Schottey, NFL National Lead Writer Aug 4, 2014
There is no worse place to be as an NFL franchise than quarterback purgatory.
News leaked Monday that the Cincinnati Bengals signed quarterback Andy Dalton to a $115 million contract over the next six years, per ESPN's Adam Schefter and Adam Caplan. Now, NFL contracts are not fully guaranteed, and those lofty numbers usually mean little to nothing, but this ostensibly puts Dalton in the driver's seat for the Bengals for the foreseeable future.
With this deal, the Bengals have condemned themselves to the worst possible situation—mediocrity.
This runs counterintuitive to what many people might think, as being truly bad actually has its benefits in the NFL—namely, high draft picks. In fact, with the new collective bargaining agreement controlling rookie salaries at the top of the draft, it's never been a better time to be terrible.
Maybe we haven't quite reached NBA levels of tanking, but there's at least some wisdom to allowing one's team to atrophy rather than consistently trying to prop it up. It's early in the process, but the Oakland Raiders and Jacksonville Jaguars are two examples of teams that have recently undergone regime changes where the new guard seemed to purposefully deep-six a few years to clear out dead cap space and acquire high draft picks.
A middling team, though, doesn't stand much of a shot—especially if the quarterback position is just as mediocre. "Propped up" is actually a great analogy for what's going on, as not only does the team receive artificial (and superficial) stability, but it's also a lot like a Hollywood prop in that it looks nice, but is likely hollow and lacking any real value.
The Bengals seem committed to heading down that road.
'Good Enough' May Not Be Good Enough These Days
Justin K. Aller/Getty Images
Dalton, frankly, might be the poster child for "just good enough" at the quarterback position in today's NFL.
I talked to former NFL quarterback Shaun King about Dalton's prospects in this new deal, and King was less than ecstatic about the dollar amount, pointing out that Dalton is good enough but has had the poor fortune of having his worst game each year in the first round of the playoffs.
King further said, "I think Dalton's maxed out. He's gotten the most out of his ability that he'll get out of it—a very mature kid coming out of TCU and he bypassed some of the issues that young quarterbacks had, hitting his ceiling right away."
One of the things about being average, though, is that the insinuation may be that the play in question is consistently average. Maybe that is true for someone like Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith, but Dalton's play has often been of the consistently inconsistent variety.
This is a story about Good Andy Dalton vs. Bad Andy Dalton.
Steve Palazzolo @PFF_Steve
Andy Dalton: the highs are high, the lows are low. But, is he capable of going on that 3-4 game playoff run?
The tweet above isn't just great because it graphically lays out the maddening issues with Dalton, but also because Steve Palazzolo posits a great question: Even if Dalton does finally win that elusive playoff game (he's currently 0-3), will he ever put together the kind of Eli Manning-like run that has earned the Giants quarterback two rings while Dalton has been just as good of a regular-season quarterback?
King believes Dalton's inconsistency is linked to his physical/arm limitations, and there's some merit to that line of thinking. In scouting, players are often tiered or ranked according to the matchups they will win at the next level.
A mid-tier quarterback like Dalton may win a significant number of matchups, but he's going to naturally look more like a scrub when the matchup overwhelms him. Unlike position players, the "matchup" may not be a one-on-one, but rather the quarterback's physical or mental limitations against the caliber of the defense or the scheme of the defensive coordinator.
Grantland's Bill Barnwell tapped into another likely culprit:
The numbers suggest that Dalton just crumbles when attacked. It's not as simple as merely big-blitzing Dalton and having him panic; the Bengals have a very good offensive line, and when that line keeps the opposition off Dalton, he remains a league-average passer. To pick an all-inclusive stat, QBR pegs Dalton as the 23rd-best quarterback in football over his three years as a pro, with a cumulative QBR of 51.5. When teams rush Dalton with five men or more, his QBR falls to 47.0, but since everybody's a little worse when they’re blitzed, that's good enough for 21st in the league.
Barnwell actually compared Dalton—in terms of composure—to guys like Blaine Gabbert and Kevin Kolb. Maybe that seems harsh, but it's worthwhile to consider that Gabbert and Kolb never had the supporting cast or pass-blocking Dalton has enjoyed during his time in the league.
This is another downside to QB purgatory. When a quarterback is young and his team has convinced itself he is its future, it makes sense to surround him with as much talent as possible. However, when does it reach the point where the team is just artificially propping up the subpar talent because he's being dragged along with the team's success rather than making the talent around him better?
It's impossible not to look at the talent around Dalton and see that the Bengals have done, literally, just about anything that can be done. The offensive line has not only been superb in terms of pass-blocking (fifth last year, according to Pro Football Focus; subscription required), but it's also been incredible in terms of depth as players have gone down and the team has continued to flourish.
If Dalton were to undergo the type of consistent defensive pressure that tormented both Philip Rivers and Cam Newton last season, it's almost impossible to predict that he would respond with the type of play those two managed in 2013.
The weapons that Dalton has, too, are about as good as can be expected. Most quarterbacks in this league would give their non-throwing arm for a receiver like A.J. Green, let alone a tight end tandem like Jermaine Gresham and Tyler Eifert with a running back stable three guys deep.
Moreover, as a team like the Bengals continues to try to reach the proverbial playoff mountaintop, it has to do so with the constraints of a salary cap. Giving a gigantic payday to an average quarterback can become the albatross to send the team on a slow descent to rock bottom.
Describing the mentality, King said the Bengals "were more comfortable going with Dalton and his low ceiling than starting over."
That's a milquetoast course the Bengals have set themselves on, but they're not alone.
The Market Is the Market
"Good enough" may not be good enough to achieve lasting success (or even a playoff win) in today's NFL.
We've had this discussion before with Tony Romo (repeatedly), Joe Flacco and Colin Kaepernick. Dalton turns 27 this season, and this is likely the biggest deal he will get. In terms of timing, that's perfect—even if Dalton hangs on for one more deal before he's done, the Bengals are handing him this money as he's supposedly hitting his prime.
I've mentioned the salary cap and CBA so far in this piece, but it's important to note that the CBA pegs that salary cap to the total revenue of the league. Thus, this inflated market for arms is not the same as the exploding free-for-all that is baseball salaries, where MLB owners willingly pay pitchers top dollar and then bemoan the same rising salaries they've created. Instead, the market follows along as a static-sized piece of the NFL's total revenue pie.
Enter television deals.
According to Brent Schrotenboer of USA Today, the NFL is hoping its total revenue rises to $25 billion from its current $10 billion in revenue over the next 13 years. This isn't like me hoping to win the lottery; this is a business projection that the NFL could easily shatter.
The 2014 season is when the NFL's new TV deals begin to kick in. With that money flowing in, the salary cap, which has been flatter than players hoped in recent years, should skyrocket. Because of that, some of the bigger-than-expected deals we've seen this offseason may simply be hedging bets.
It's possible to think about this two ways: first, that players like Dalton still need to take up a commensurate piece of the total salary cap as everybody gets paid more. However, and most importantly in this regard, we may simply have to change our paradigms about what money totals mean as the NFL is raking it in hand over fist.
Earlier this year, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk pointed out just how high that cap could go:
When the salary cap jumped from $123 million to $133 million last week, some suggested it could move to $140 million in 2015 and $150 million in 2016.
Think higher.
One source with knowledge of the process (but not the same source who was on the money—pun lame but intended—when providing info about the 2014 cap) tells PFT that the cap could spike to $145 million in 2015 and a whopping $160 million in 2016.
With the market expanding, Shaun King even noted that we might see one more of these head-scratching deals soon.
"Whether it's Flacco, Romo, now it's Dalton, that's the going rate now," King said. "If you represent Alex Smith, you're telling the Chiefs that this is what the going rate is. The Chiefs are saying, 'But you're not worth that,' but it's the market now."
With that in mind, the sticker shock of Dalton's deal today may easily be replaced by considering this a bargain deal down the road. That's just the nature of where we are in a transitional period of the multibillion-dollar business that is the NFL.
All that said and dollars aside, the biggest argument against this deal is not really what Dalton is being paid. Frankly, any owner in the NFL can give as much money to whoever he wants and it's zero skin off any of our backs.
No, the question here is if the Bengals have hitched their wagon to a horse that isn't worth it. The financial investment might not matter in the long run, but what that investment means does.
Dalton has not shown that he can be the guy the Bengals think they are committing to long term. Doing so now may be the safer option, but it may end up being the point we all look back to when things started to go south for the Bengals.
Michael Schottey is an NFL National Lead Writer for Bleacher Report and a member of the Pro Football Writers of America. Find more of his stuff on his archive page and follow him on Twitter. Unless otherwise cited, all quotes were obtained firsthand.
By Michael Schottey, NFL National Lead Writer Aug 4, 2014
There is no worse place to be as an NFL franchise than quarterback purgatory.
News leaked Monday that the Cincinnati Bengals signed quarterback Andy Dalton to a $115 million contract over the next six years, per ESPN's Adam Schefter and Adam Caplan. Now, NFL contracts are not fully guaranteed, and those lofty numbers usually mean little to nothing, but this ostensibly puts Dalton in the driver's seat for the Bengals for the foreseeable future.
With this deal, the Bengals have condemned themselves to the worst possible situation—mediocrity.
This runs counterintuitive to what many people might think, as being truly bad actually has its benefits in the NFL—namely, high draft picks. In fact, with the new collective bargaining agreement controlling rookie salaries at the top of the draft, it's never been a better time to be terrible.
Maybe we haven't quite reached NBA levels of tanking, but there's at least some wisdom to allowing one's team to atrophy rather than consistently trying to prop it up. It's early in the process, but the Oakland Raiders and Jacksonville Jaguars are two examples of teams that have recently undergone regime changes where the new guard seemed to purposefully deep-six a few years to clear out dead cap space and acquire high draft picks.
A middling team, though, doesn't stand much of a shot—especially if the quarterback position is just as mediocre. "Propped up" is actually a great analogy for what's going on, as not only does the team receive artificial (and superficial) stability, but it's also a lot like a Hollywood prop in that it looks nice, but is likely hollow and lacking any real value.
The Bengals seem committed to heading down that road.
'Good Enough' May Not Be Good Enough These Days
Justin K. Aller/Getty Images
Dalton, frankly, might be the poster child for "just good enough" at the quarterback position in today's NFL.
I talked to former NFL quarterback Shaun King about Dalton's prospects in this new deal, and King was less than ecstatic about the dollar amount, pointing out that Dalton is good enough but has had the poor fortune of having his worst game each year in the first round of the playoffs.
King further said, "I think Dalton's maxed out. He's gotten the most out of his ability that he'll get out of it—a very mature kid coming out of TCU and he bypassed some of the issues that young quarterbacks had, hitting his ceiling right away."
One of the things about being average, though, is that the insinuation may be that the play in question is consistently average. Maybe that is true for someone like Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith, but Dalton's play has often been of the consistently inconsistent variety.
This is a story about Good Andy Dalton vs. Bad Andy Dalton.
Steve Palazzolo @PFF_Steve
Andy Dalton: the highs are high, the lows are low. But, is he capable of going on that 3-4 game playoff run?
The tweet above isn't just great because it graphically lays out the maddening issues with Dalton, but also because Steve Palazzolo posits a great question: Even if Dalton does finally win that elusive playoff game (he's currently 0-3), will he ever put together the kind of Eli Manning-like run that has earned the Giants quarterback two rings while Dalton has been just as good of a regular-season quarterback?
King believes Dalton's inconsistency is linked to his physical/arm limitations, and there's some merit to that line of thinking. In scouting, players are often tiered or ranked according to the matchups they will win at the next level.
A mid-tier quarterback like Dalton may win a significant number of matchups, but he's going to naturally look more like a scrub when the matchup overwhelms him. Unlike position players, the "matchup" may not be a one-on-one, but rather the quarterback's physical or mental limitations against the caliber of the defense or the scheme of the defensive coordinator.
Grantland's Bill Barnwell tapped into another likely culprit:
The numbers suggest that Dalton just crumbles when attacked. It's not as simple as merely big-blitzing Dalton and having him panic; the Bengals have a very good offensive line, and when that line keeps the opposition off Dalton, he remains a league-average passer. To pick an all-inclusive stat, QBR pegs Dalton as the 23rd-best quarterback in football over his three years as a pro, with a cumulative QBR of 51.5. When teams rush Dalton with five men or more, his QBR falls to 47.0, but since everybody's a little worse when they’re blitzed, that's good enough for 21st in the league.
Barnwell actually compared Dalton—in terms of composure—to guys like Blaine Gabbert and Kevin Kolb. Maybe that seems harsh, but it's worthwhile to consider that Gabbert and Kolb never had the supporting cast or pass-blocking Dalton has enjoyed during his time in the league.
This is another downside to QB purgatory. When a quarterback is young and his team has convinced itself he is its future, it makes sense to surround him with as much talent as possible. However, when does it reach the point where the team is just artificially propping up the subpar talent because he's being dragged along with the team's success rather than making the talent around him better?
It's impossible not to look at the talent around Dalton and see that the Bengals have done, literally, just about anything that can be done. The offensive line has not only been superb in terms of pass-blocking (fifth last year, according to Pro Football Focus; subscription required), but it's also been incredible in terms of depth as players have gone down and the team has continued to flourish.
If Dalton were to undergo the type of consistent defensive pressure that tormented both Philip Rivers and Cam Newton last season, it's almost impossible to predict that he would respond with the type of play those two managed in 2013.
The weapons that Dalton has, too, are about as good as can be expected. Most quarterbacks in this league would give their non-throwing arm for a receiver like A.J. Green, let alone a tight end tandem like Jermaine Gresham and Tyler Eifert with a running back stable three guys deep.
Moreover, as a team like the Bengals continues to try to reach the proverbial playoff mountaintop, it has to do so with the constraints of a salary cap. Giving a gigantic payday to an average quarterback can become the albatross to send the team on a slow descent to rock bottom.
Describing the mentality, King said the Bengals "were more comfortable going with Dalton and his low ceiling than starting over."
That's a milquetoast course the Bengals have set themselves on, but they're not alone.
The Market Is the Market
"Good enough" may not be good enough to achieve lasting success (or even a playoff win) in today's NFL.
We've had this discussion before with Tony Romo (repeatedly), Joe Flacco and Colin Kaepernick. Dalton turns 27 this season, and this is likely the biggest deal he will get. In terms of timing, that's perfect—even if Dalton hangs on for one more deal before he's done, the Bengals are handing him this money as he's supposedly hitting his prime.
I've mentioned the salary cap and CBA so far in this piece, but it's important to note that the CBA pegs that salary cap to the total revenue of the league. Thus, this inflated market for arms is not the same as the exploding free-for-all that is baseball salaries, where MLB owners willingly pay pitchers top dollar and then bemoan the same rising salaries they've created. Instead, the market follows along as a static-sized piece of the NFL's total revenue pie.
Enter television deals.
According to Brent Schrotenboer of USA Today, the NFL is hoping its total revenue rises to $25 billion from its current $10 billion in revenue over the next 13 years. This isn't like me hoping to win the lottery; this is a business projection that the NFL could easily shatter.
The 2014 season is when the NFL's new TV deals begin to kick in. With that money flowing in, the salary cap, which has been flatter than players hoped in recent years, should skyrocket. Because of that, some of the bigger-than-expected deals we've seen this offseason may simply be hedging bets.
It's possible to think about this two ways: first, that players like Dalton still need to take up a commensurate piece of the total salary cap as everybody gets paid more. However, and most importantly in this regard, we may simply have to change our paradigms about what money totals mean as the NFL is raking it in hand over fist.
Earlier this year, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk pointed out just how high that cap could go:
When the salary cap jumped from $123 million to $133 million last week, some suggested it could move to $140 million in 2015 and $150 million in 2016.
Think higher.
One source with knowledge of the process (but not the same source who was on the money—pun lame but intended—when providing info about the 2014 cap) tells PFT that the cap could spike to $145 million in 2015 and a whopping $160 million in 2016.
With the market expanding, Shaun King even noted that we might see one more of these head-scratching deals soon.
"Whether it's Flacco, Romo, now it's Dalton, that's the going rate now," King said. "If you represent Alex Smith, you're telling the Chiefs that this is what the going rate is. The Chiefs are saying, 'But you're not worth that,' but it's the market now."
With that in mind, the sticker shock of Dalton's deal today may easily be replaced by considering this a bargain deal down the road. That's just the nature of where we are in a transitional period of the multibillion-dollar business that is the NFL.
All that said and dollars aside, the biggest argument against this deal is not really what Dalton is being paid. Frankly, any owner in the NFL can give as much money to whoever he wants and it's zero skin off any of our backs.
No, the question here is if the Bengals have hitched their wagon to a horse that isn't worth it. The financial investment might not matter in the long run, but what that investment means does.
Dalton has not shown that he can be the guy the Bengals think they are committing to long term. Doing so now may be the safer option, but it may end up being the point we all look back to when things started to go south for the Bengals.
Michael Schottey is an NFL National Lead Writer for Bleacher Report and a member of the Pro Football Writers of America. Find more of his stuff on his archive page and follow him on Twitter. Unless otherwise cited, all quotes were obtained firsthand.
simonblaze
Pro Bowler
- Joined
- Jun 20, 2014
- Messages
- 1,108
- Name
- Simonblaze
I certainly think Bradford can be and will be better than Dalton but hasn't produced anywhere near his level yet. Whether or not that's Sam's fault is besides the point. If Bradford has a good season this upcoming year it'd be smart to sign him up long term sooner rather than later. It'll save us some money in the long run.
RamBill
Legend
- Joined
- Jul 31, 2010
- Messages
- 8,874
Tipsheet: Dalton contract raises bar for Bradford
• By Jeff Gordon
http://www.stltoday.com/sports/colu...cle_8e91526e-c000-5ca5-bc70-2f092ae056f2.html
Sam Bradford appears to be in no rush to sign a contract extension with the Rams.
And why should he be? Other quarterbacks are signing crazy deals left and right. All of them have accomplished more than Bradford has, true, but the market will favor him if the Rams finally step forward.
The latest mind-boggling deal will pay Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton up to $115 million through 2020. The base value of the contract is a more realistic $96 million over six years and the Bengals have some escape hatches along the way.
Still, that is a heck of a deal for Dalton. He will collect $22 million during the first six months of the deal.
"We're betting big on him because we believe in him," Bengals owner Mike Brown said at a Monday news conference. "We're looking forward to the future with Andy."
Dalton has stayed healthy and delivered three productive regular seasons in Cincinnati. He piled up lots of TD passes and kept the Bengals in the playoff hunt.
But no credible expert ranks him among the NFL's elite quarterbacks. Dalton has come up small in his biggest games.
So every quarterback coming due for a new deal in the next few years — including the star-crossed Bradford — is eying this deal with great interest.
NFL owners are willing to overpay quarterbacks rather than face the Great Unknown of starting over with an unproven new guy.
ASSESSING DALTON'S DEAL
Here is what some folks were writing about this contract:
Bill Barnwell, ESPN.com: "For what it’s worth, you can make a statistical case that Dalton is a worthwhile passer. Many of his rate statistics — yards per attempt, touchdown percentage, passer rating, and QBR — have improved during each of his three professional seasons, even as he’s thrown more frequently. He hasn’t missed a start and hasn’t even shown up on the injury report since Week 1 of the 2012 season . . . Dalton is a winner; during his first three seasons, Dalton has won 30 games and made the playoffs three times. The only other quarterbacks in league history to do that are Dan Marino (yay!) and Joe Flacco ( … OK?). And all of that doesn’t seem to matter, because Dalton has been awful in the playoffs. It’s a problem that destroyed Cincinnati in last year’s loss to the Chargers and, left unsolved, will almost certainly prevent him from leading the Bengals — or any other NFL team — to a Super Bowl. Andy Dalton is not without merit, but he has one major problem that needs to be corrected: He can’t reliably handle pass pressure. Dalton comes from the Kevin Kolb and Blaine Gabbert school, which is a school that should probably be shut down, demolished, and declared a Superfund site. Quarterbacks in this class often struggle to diagnose pressure before the snap and do a subpar job of capturing who exactly is coming at them when defenses disguise their blitzers. Even worse, when they do feel even the tiniest bit of pressure heading in their direction, passers like Kolb and Gabbert bail out of the pocket and frantically sprint toward the sideline like ants trying to escape feet. The coup de grâce is a dangerous pass, one often thrown to the first hint of a friendly uniform without resetting and reexamining the field to see where defenders have settled."
Pete Prisco, CBSSports.com: "You saw the contract numbers for Andy Dalton's extension Monday and you laughed. It was probably a loud one, too. What the hell are the Cincinnati Bengals doing giving Dalton a six-year extension for $115 million, right? What they are doing is being smart, especially if the contract is structured the right way. Dalton has flaws and has come up small in the playoffs, but he has taken the Bengals to the playoffs each of his first three seasons, which is special. He's also thrown 80 touchdown passes in those three seasons, 33 last season, which is why extending him for six seasons makes sense. Yet ripping Dalton is a blood sport. He's like Carson Palmer. He's like Tony Romo. They've all had regular-season success, but have not got it done in the playoffs. So they stink. They're chokers. Yet players like Russell Wilson and Colin Kaepernick are considered rising stars because, playing on good teams, they've won in the postseason. Wilson and Kaepernick have talent, but I've had a handful of NFL people tell me the Seahawks would have won the Super Bowl last season with Dalton playing quarterback."
Doug Farrar, SI.com: "Those opposed to this kind of extension might note that the cap charge could prevent the team from handing out new deals to other valuable players, including receiver A.J. Green, who was selected in the first round of the 2011 draft, and who tends to make Dalton look a bit better than he actually is with his acrobatic catches of Dalton's occasionally errant deep balls. And there's the matter of Dalton's performances in the playoffs -- in three playoff games (all losses), Dalton has completed 70-of-123 passes for 718 yards, one touchdown and six interceptions."
Jarrett Bell, USA Today.com: "Dalton commands a huge price tag because he plays quarterback, with its inflationary pay scale. Remember, Tony Romo – who hasn't exactly made his mark in the playoffs, either -- is guaranteed $55 million from the Cowboys. Maybe that's why they passed on Johnny Manziel. But just because Dalton is a quarterback doesn't mean it is money well spent. The jury is out on that. Two years ago, Joe Flacco's contract talks with the Baltimore Ravens broke down and he wound up betting on himself in the final year of his contract. Then he got red-hot in the postseason and won the Super Bowl. Flacco cashed in for several million dollars more per year than had been previously discussed. Dalton didn't have to bet on himself like Flacco. But the Bengals, hardly getting a bargain, are betting on him in a huge way."
Frank Schwab, Yahoo! Sports: "Jay Cutler's contract with the Bears, for $126.7 million over seven years after making all of one Pro Bowl in his career, really was the sign that the quarterback market was ruined. Dalton's deal has reinforced that the market is out of control. Teams get crippled by fear of the unknown at quarterback. There's no way Dalton, whom I defend regularly because people have ignored the good things he has done (and he has done some good things), could be worth more than $19 million per year. But teams like the Bengals would rather pay Dalton two or three times what he's worth than deal with the criticism that would come if they let him go and couldn't replace him immediately. It sounds like a dumb business model, but NFL teams routinely do it. The quarterback market for the non-stars at the position is the most inefficient in sports. And it affects other teams. Wilson, (Andrew) Luck, (Cam) Newton and other young quarterbacks like Washington's Robert Griffin III probably have to start the bidding at $25 million per year if Dalton got what he did, right? Dalton has put up 11,360 yards and 80 touchdowns while taking the Bengals to the playoffs in all three of his seasons. He has seen his interceptions rise each season since his rookie year. He threw 20 of them last year and is routinely criticized for his arm strength limitations and his failures in the playoffs. Not even his strongest backers would confuse Dalton for a top-tier quarterback. And he just signed an extension that could be worth $115 million, which is $5 million more than Aaron Rodgers got (Rodgers got that over five years; Dalton got six)."
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while the NFC West braces for the rowdy Rams defense:
Just how quickly can the Bengals get out from under that Dalton contract?
Say, has Michael Sam became a bit of a glory hound?
Can Yasiel Puig learn a lot by playing in the same city as Albert Pujols?
Say, how bad do you want that ice cream bar and those peanut butter cups?
• By Jeff Gordon
http://www.stltoday.com/sports/colu...cle_8e91526e-c000-5ca5-bc70-2f092ae056f2.html
Sam Bradford appears to be in no rush to sign a contract extension with the Rams.
And why should he be? Other quarterbacks are signing crazy deals left and right. All of them have accomplished more than Bradford has, true, but the market will favor him if the Rams finally step forward.
The latest mind-boggling deal will pay Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton up to $115 million through 2020. The base value of the contract is a more realistic $96 million over six years and the Bengals have some escape hatches along the way.
Still, that is a heck of a deal for Dalton. He will collect $22 million during the first six months of the deal.
"We're betting big on him because we believe in him," Bengals owner Mike Brown said at a Monday news conference. "We're looking forward to the future with Andy."
Dalton has stayed healthy and delivered three productive regular seasons in Cincinnati. He piled up lots of TD passes and kept the Bengals in the playoff hunt.
But no credible expert ranks him among the NFL's elite quarterbacks. Dalton has come up small in his biggest games.
So every quarterback coming due for a new deal in the next few years — including the star-crossed Bradford — is eying this deal with great interest.
NFL owners are willing to overpay quarterbacks rather than face the Great Unknown of starting over with an unproven new guy.
ASSESSING DALTON'S DEAL
Here is what some folks were writing about this contract:
Bill Barnwell, ESPN.com: "For what it’s worth, you can make a statistical case that Dalton is a worthwhile passer. Many of his rate statistics — yards per attempt, touchdown percentage, passer rating, and QBR — have improved during each of his three professional seasons, even as he’s thrown more frequently. He hasn’t missed a start and hasn’t even shown up on the injury report since Week 1 of the 2012 season . . . Dalton is a winner; during his first three seasons, Dalton has won 30 games and made the playoffs three times. The only other quarterbacks in league history to do that are Dan Marino (yay!) and Joe Flacco ( … OK?). And all of that doesn’t seem to matter, because Dalton has been awful in the playoffs. It’s a problem that destroyed Cincinnati in last year’s loss to the Chargers and, left unsolved, will almost certainly prevent him from leading the Bengals — or any other NFL team — to a Super Bowl. Andy Dalton is not without merit, but he has one major problem that needs to be corrected: He can’t reliably handle pass pressure. Dalton comes from the Kevin Kolb and Blaine Gabbert school, which is a school that should probably be shut down, demolished, and declared a Superfund site. Quarterbacks in this class often struggle to diagnose pressure before the snap and do a subpar job of capturing who exactly is coming at them when defenses disguise their blitzers. Even worse, when they do feel even the tiniest bit of pressure heading in their direction, passers like Kolb and Gabbert bail out of the pocket and frantically sprint toward the sideline like ants trying to escape feet. The coup de grâce is a dangerous pass, one often thrown to the first hint of a friendly uniform without resetting and reexamining the field to see where defenders have settled."
Pete Prisco, CBSSports.com: "You saw the contract numbers for Andy Dalton's extension Monday and you laughed. It was probably a loud one, too. What the hell are the Cincinnati Bengals doing giving Dalton a six-year extension for $115 million, right? What they are doing is being smart, especially if the contract is structured the right way. Dalton has flaws and has come up small in the playoffs, but he has taken the Bengals to the playoffs each of his first three seasons, which is special. He's also thrown 80 touchdown passes in those three seasons, 33 last season, which is why extending him for six seasons makes sense. Yet ripping Dalton is a blood sport. He's like Carson Palmer. He's like Tony Romo. They've all had regular-season success, but have not got it done in the playoffs. So they stink. They're chokers. Yet players like Russell Wilson and Colin Kaepernick are considered rising stars because, playing on good teams, they've won in the postseason. Wilson and Kaepernick have talent, but I've had a handful of NFL people tell me the Seahawks would have won the Super Bowl last season with Dalton playing quarterback."
Doug Farrar, SI.com: "Those opposed to this kind of extension might note that the cap charge could prevent the team from handing out new deals to other valuable players, including receiver A.J. Green, who was selected in the first round of the 2011 draft, and who tends to make Dalton look a bit better than he actually is with his acrobatic catches of Dalton's occasionally errant deep balls. And there's the matter of Dalton's performances in the playoffs -- in three playoff games (all losses), Dalton has completed 70-of-123 passes for 718 yards, one touchdown and six interceptions."
Jarrett Bell, USA Today.com: "Dalton commands a huge price tag because he plays quarterback, with its inflationary pay scale. Remember, Tony Romo – who hasn't exactly made his mark in the playoffs, either -- is guaranteed $55 million from the Cowboys. Maybe that's why they passed on Johnny Manziel. But just because Dalton is a quarterback doesn't mean it is money well spent. The jury is out on that. Two years ago, Joe Flacco's contract talks with the Baltimore Ravens broke down and he wound up betting on himself in the final year of his contract. Then he got red-hot in the postseason and won the Super Bowl. Flacco cashed in for several million dollars more per year than had been previously discussed. Dalton didn't have to bet on himself like Flacco. But the Bengals, hardly getting a bargain, are betting on him in a huge way."
Frank Schwab, Yahoo! Sports: "Jay Cutler's contract with the Bears, for $126.7 million over seven years after making all of one Pro Bowl in his career, really was the sign that the quarterback market was ruined. Dalton's deal has reinforced that the market is out of control. Teams get crippled by fear of the unknown at quarterback. There's no way Dalton, whom I defend regularly because people have ignored the good things he has done (and he has done some good things), could be worth more than $19 million per year. But teams like the Bengals would rather pay Dalton two or three times what he's worth than deal with the criticism that would come if they let him go and couldn't replace him immediately. It sounds like a dumb business model, but NFL teams routinely do it. The quarterback market for the non-stars at the position is the most inefficient in sports. And it affects other teams. Wilson, (Andrew) Luck, (Cam) Newton and other young quarterbacks like Washington's Robert Griffin III probably have to start the bidding at $25 million per year if Dalton got what he did, right? Dalton has put up 11,360 yards and 80 touchdowns while taking the Bengals to the playoffs in all three of his seasons. He has seen his interceptions rise each season since his rookie year. He threw 20 of them last year and is routinely criticized for his arm strength limitations and his failures in the playoffs. Not even his strongest backers would confuse Dalton for a top-tier quarterback. And he just signed an extension that could be worth $115 million, which is $5 million more than Aaron Rodgers got (Rodgers got that over five years; Dalton got six)."
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while the NFC West braces for the rowdy Rams defense:
Just how quickly can the Bengals get out from under that Dalton contract?
Say, has Michael Sam became a bit of a glory hound?
Can Yasiel Puig learn a lot by playing in the same city as Albert Pujols?
Say, how bad do you want that ice cream bar and those peanut butter cups?